Tottenham assistant Cristian Stellini took aim at his front three after the club’s 1-0 defeat in the FA Cup fifth round to Sheffield United. Iliman Ndiaye got the only goal of the game as the hosts staged a cup upset and will face Blackburn in the quarter-finals, having advanced past Harry Kane and co.
Stellini remained on the touchline as Antonio Conte is still recovering from surgery after having his gallbladder removed, though prior to the game the coach revealed that the Italian boss is close to a return.
Kane was left on the bench by Stellini in favour of Richarlison, Son Heung-min and Lucas Moura, but the acting head coach made a thinly-veiled dig at his front three after the game and claimed that they should have been enough to defeat a Championship opponent. “No it’s not a regret [dropping Kane],” Stellini said.
“We also have to look at the medium period and we have many games. Harry Kane played a lot, one time with fever and another with a problem. It’s not about Harry. We played with Lucas, Richarlison and Sonny. I think that should be good enough.”
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“If you don’t win a game like this its because something was not perfect and today our energy was not enough to put the opponent in a great difficulty. We had opportunities to score, but now we have to analyse the goal we conceded. In the moment if you concede a goal you need time to recover.
“There was more energy from the changes, but we have to improve a lot. I can only apologise to the fans for our performance and they deserve much more than this.”
Stellini and Tottenham will be hoping to bounce back from the defeat to Sheffield United next away to Wolves on Saturday, as despite exiting the FA Cup they remain in charge of their fate in their hope to finish in the top four of the Premier League and will attempt to overturn a 1-0 deficit to AC Milan in the second leg of Spurs’ Champions League last 16 tie next week.
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